Lightweight and robust polymer bearing technology for Moon Buggy in NASA competition

Plastic bearing technology helps young designers win NASA's Human Exploration Rover Challenge.

NASA's international Great Moonbuggy Race is an annual event in which young design engineers compete against each other with their vehicles. On the very demanding hilly parkour, the teams are confronted with challenges very similar to those on the surface of Mars. Here, very light, resistant polymer bearing technology helped the young designers on the NASA Space Education Team from Leipzig to victory.

With their visit to Cologne, the NASA Space Education Team from Leipzig were able to gain insights into where their bearings come from and how they are manufactured and tested to enable them to withstand even those conditions prevailing in the Moonbuggy.
The many new impressions they gained during their visit here immediately gave them many new ideas. The plans are for even more metal components to be replaced with plastic solutions in the new Moonbuggy.
 
We are very pleased about this. Thanks to young and courageous developers and constructors like these, plastics will take on an increasingly important role in future and provide many new innovative solutions and applications.